As you will all know from my newsletter that we have had another outbreak of Covid in the school. I did think that we would have finished with this now but obviously the virus had other ideas. I would like to thank parents who have been testing their children for letting us know and keeping their children off for five days which is the guidance we have been given. As testing is no longer a legal requirement we can no longer tell you how long to test for but what I do ask is that if any child is unwell you do not send them in and you keep them off until they recover. This is soon going to be the only way we manage Covid now it is moving to endemic status. The only measures we are being asked to keep in place are good ventilation, frequent handwashing and an enhanced cleaning programme and I would like to assure you all that we are maintaining all of those.

At least the weather is improving which means it is becoming more bearable to have the windows open in classrooms and the extra layers will soon no longer be required. It also means that more outdoor sports can take place and we have been making the most of that this week. Some of the Year 3 and 4 took part in a football tournament yesterday morning and the older boys took place in a football match last night. The Years 3 and 4 finished 5^th in the tournament and the older boys won one and drew one of their matches so it was a pretty successful showing across the board. Tonight the girls have a football match against Ladbrooke and next week they have a netball match against Oakmere. I do like it when all these additional events can take place in school because it makes it a far more fulfilling experience for the children in school.

Next week the excitement continues because, as I stated above, some of the children are involved in a netball match and it is Red Nose Day on Friday. To help celebrate this day the children can come to school in no uniform and as long as they are wearing a red nose they will not have to make an additional donation to the charity – unless they want to. Children who are not wearing red noses will need to bring in at least one pound and they can hand their donation to their class teacher and we will send it in along with the money we have made from selling noses. I am sorry that we ran out in school – in the future we will have to make sure that we buy even more noses to sell in school.

It is also a major week for children in Year 3 and 4 because they are going on their PGL trip which is taking place at the Caythorpe Activity Centre. They are only going away for a night but I know they are going to have a fun-filled action packed time and they will be able to recover over the weekend so they are all refreshed for the following Monday morning. As I am joining them I had better make sure that I get plenty of rest over the weekend so I can keep up with them. It also means that I will not be producing a blog next week but I will tell you all about my trip the following week.